DCHP-1 Online
pew [< F pieu > L palus pole] Esp. Nfld 
n. a long-handled, pronged device used for forking fish from boat to wharf or stage.
- 1835 (1836) Also a large species of fish, called the horse-mackarel, resembling that fish in every particular, but ten feet in length, had been killed here last summer, by a girl with a "pew," or fork used for throwing fish from the boats on the "stages."
- 1861 The fish are not taken out by hand, but by an instrument called a "pew," which is a prong with one point. Should a fish be damaged in the body, it is deteriorated in value; so great care is taken to stick the pew through the head of the cod, and thus to land it on the stagehead, where it undergoes the first process of salting.
- 1883 (1889) . . . the fish are flung one by one from the boat to the floor of the stage, with an instrument resembling a small pitchfork, and called a "pew."
- 1835 (1836) Also a large species of fish, called the horse-mackarel, resembling that fish in every particular, but ten feet in length, had been killed here last summer, by a girl with a "pew," or fork used for throwing fish from the boats on the "stages."